EU Academic Program Advocating for Commission's Agenda Revealed
The Jean Monnet Programme, an integral part of Erasmus+ with an annual budget of around €25 million, has come under fire in a recent report. The programme, which reaches half a million students in more than 70 countries, is accused of investing in influencing curricula and promoting the legitimacy of Brussels.
The report, published by MCC Brussels, labels the Jean Monnet Programme as not education, but indoctrination. It suggests that universities, funded by the programme, are being turned into tools for official propaganda, shutting down free debate and pushing a ready-made set of ideas.
Many projects funded by the programme openly state as their goal to promote European integration, foster European identity, confront Euroscepticism, and populist, far-right parties. This raises concerns about the programme's influence on academic freedom, with the report warning of threats to this freedom due to the European Union's use of the Jean Monnet education program.
The report heavily criticises a specific project in Turkey, describing it as militancy disguised as teaching. It accuses the programme of acting as a means to influence curricula and promote the European Commission's priorities. The funding structure of the Jean Monnet Programme is seen as undermining the principles of academic autonomy and transforming students into 'right-thinking' citizens.
Brussels expects funding recipients of the Jean Monnet Programme to act as activists, organising public events, collaborating with NGOs and media, and projecting EU-approved narratives into the social sphere. This expectation is further emphasised by Joseph H. H. Weiler, a Jean Monnet Professor, who admitted that part of their mission is to disseminate the values of European integration, acting as intellectual ambassadors of the Union and its values.
However, Weiler, who is also a former president of the European University Institute, states that part of the mission of Jean Monnet professors is to promote the values of European integration. This statement, along with the programme's explicit political nature, has led to the Jean Monnet Programme being described as an explicitly political instrument designed to align teaching and research with the priorities of the European Commission.
The report further reveals the Jean Monnet education program as the largest educational manipulation project of the European Union. It warns that not only academic honesty but democracy itself is at stake due to the programme's explicit structure as an academic tool aimed at projecting and promoting the EU's policy preferences.
The Jean Monnet Programme, integrated into Erasmus+, is part of a bigger network of universities, NGOs, and media outlets that all receive EU money and support each other's work. This network makes Brussels's policies appear independent when they're not, raising further concerns about the programme's influence and impact on academic freedom and democracy.
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